Hello from Portland, OR

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MG_OR

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Joined
Jul 15, 2010
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Location
Athens, GA
Just saying hello after reading the forums for the past few days.

Been wanting to try homebrewing for a while now - roasting my own coffee for a long time now, homebrewing beer seems like a nice next step. Much more involved than roasting, so I am still trying to get all the background before taking the plunge (I'm also stalking craigslist to see if I can get a "starter setup" - currently unemployed means I am trying to get into it on the cheap).

Still not sure if it is viable for me since we have no temperature control in our house (it stays warm in the summer and cold in the winter), but our small cellar might work.

I'll update if I actually get started
 
Greetings MG OR and welcome to the obsession. Given your employment status, look in to one of the Home Brew clubs in Portland. I find home brewers are generally a great bunch of people and some might even have you over to use their equipment to brew a batch.

Good luck and again, welcome!
 
Welcome to HBT! Ferment in the bathtub...most temperature stable place in the house! Unless you're showering with your fermenter! :D
 
Basic brewing is simpler than roasting coffee and a cellar is a great place to ferment and store beer.
 
Basic brewing is simpler than roasting coffee and a cellar is a great place to ferment and store beer.

Given how quick and easy my coffee roasting setup is (it takes 15-20 minutes once a week with little to no supervision, just monitoring the smell/sounds) I can't imagine brewing to be simpler. Of course having a dedicated roaster makes it pretty easy.

I just put a thermometer down in the cellar to see what things are lie down there (its actually more of a hole dug into the ground where the wood furnace used to be).

And thanks for the welcomes
 
definitely keep checking craigslist. i've been seeing starter kits pop up every couple of weeks for cheap.
 
CL in Portland is full of brewing stuff all the time. I ferment in my basement in SW PDX - pretty constant temperature year round.
 
So I have found a guy selling off some of his homebrew stuff. He has a couple/few plastic fermenting buckets and airlocks, a big pot (~3 gal or so, which is much bigger than anything I have now), and a bunch of corny kegs.

From what he has said, it sounds like he shortened one of the draws for one corny keg so that he can do primary fermentation in that keg (shortening the draw so he doesn't get sludge perhaps?), and then transferring to a second keg after primary and then letting it come up to pressure in the second keg.

My question is - does this make sense, and will I be jumping in over my head going straight into keg fermenting? I have been collecting random parts for my keezer (and will be getting it finished before my first beer ever gets done).

Second, I have read about force carbing from the keezer/kegerator setup, but not knowing ALL that much about the homebrew process - is this necessary? And would I be force-carbing for primary or secondary?
 
If you want to do full batch brewing you need a minimum of a 7.5 gallon pot IMHO. Anything less and you will have to be watching it very closely for boil overs, and they aren't any fun.

I would use the kegs for kegging and get buckets from primary and secondary, they are much easier to clean.
 
So I have found a guy selling off some of his homebrew stuff. He has a couple/few plastic fermenting buckets and airlocks, a big pot (~3 gal or so, which is much bigger than anything I have now), and a bunch of corny kegs.

From what he has said, it sounds like he shortened one of the draws for one corny keg so that he can do primary fermentation in that keg (shortening the draw so he doesn't get sludge perhaps?), and then transferring to a second keg after primary and then letting it come up to pressure in the second keg.

My question is - does this make sense, and will I be jumping in over my head going straight into keg fermenting? I have been collecting random parts for my keezer (and will be getting it finished before my first beer ever gets done).

Second, I have read about force carbing from the keezer/kegerator setup, but not knowing ALL that much about the homebrew process - is this necessary? And would I be force-carbing for primary or secondary?

I cannot comment on the kegging stuff since I bottle but I just got a sweet fridge off of CL for $50 and ordered a temp controller which should be here in a week. Lagers here I come!!

I think if you can get a good deal on equipment and can spare the money you should get it. If for some reason you don't use it you can surely get your money back out of by selling it.

I am going to brewing soon and am in Gladstone so if intersted in seeing what an all-grain brewday involves I would be happy to show you! (I may have a few leftovers from my last three batches too;)
 
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